Royal Mail share price: Analysts flag 'massive' Christmas trading

[TrueBlueTerrier]

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Royal Mail Group (LON:RMG) will deliver ‘massive’ Christmas trading figures on Thursday, City A.M. reports, quoting analysts. Investors are also likely to look out for updates on the postal operator’s talks with the Communication Workers Union (CWU).

Royal Mail’s share price has fallen deep into the red, having given up 1.47 percent to 456.00p as of 10:44 GMT. The stock is underperforming the FTSE 250 index which has climbed into positive territory and currently stands 0.06 percent higher at 20,872.58 points. The group’s shares are up by more than one percent over the past year.

‘Massive’ Christmas trading

Royal Mail is scheduled to update investors on its Christmas performance on Thursday and City A.M. reports that Hargreaves Lansdown equity analyst Nicholas Hyett as noting that the period is ‘massive’ for the privatised postal operator.

“The group opened six temporary parcel sort centres and recruited over 20,000 staff so a poor showing here has the potential to undo a lot of the good work in the first half,” the analyst elaborated, adding that numbers from the British Retail Consortium suggested that “online retail had a strong Christmas, boding well for Royal Mail’s parcels business”.

Hyett also commented on Royal Mail’s negotiations with the CWU, noting that “until an agreement is reached, tense industrial relations could slow further cost-saving initiatives”.

Other analysts on group

The 15 analysts offering 12-month price targets for Royal Mail for the Financial Times have a median target of 445.00p on the shares, with a high estimate of 590.00p and a low estimate of 300.00p. As of January 13, the consensus forecast amongst 17 polled investment analysts covering the blue-chip group advises investors to hold their position in the company.

UBS meanwhile recently commented that it expects a slowdown in Royal Mail’s UK parcel volume growth in the second half to three percent along with a marginal deterioration in letter volumes to 5.5 percent.

As of 11:08 GMT, Monday, 15 January, Royal Mail share price is 455.60p.

[worktotime]

yer and any massive profit over the xmas period is down to all the hard working posties , and not the powers above great xmas planning as that was the same as every year .

[A2B]

yer and any massive profit over the xmas period is down to all the hard working posties , and not the powers above great xmas planning as that was the same as every year .

The way i read it is the announcement of the Christmas trading figures is "massive" for Royal Mail not that Royal Mail had massive sales over Christmas, another clickbait headline

[El-Bandito]

An unnamed analyist. British journalism at it's very best. The costcutting I have witnessed, personally, this 'pressure',was fantastic news for shareholders.More of the same next Christmas hopefully. Using logistic,upper management etc doing overpaid underworked postie work,instead of paying out overtime is good for RMG.